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The Elephant In The Room

At the moment, I feel isolated in my thoughts, feelings and emotions. I feel lost in a complicated and confusing world that I am struggling to understand or articulate about. It is difficult to explain the hurt and pain I am feelings at this present time. I am just watching daily life unfold and not really having an opinion or view on any situations that arises.

On some days I can ‘put on a front’ and say to the outside world that ‘I am strong and together’ but I am not.

This is personally one of my biggest downfalls in life, is that I project and voice that I am coping and dealing with the daily trauma but inside I am struggling to comprehend and process to raw, gritty memories. Since I was young everyone thought that I would be fine in life, often my family have saI’d that my brother would be the one to struggle and now look how the tide has turned. I would never wish any of this on my brother or my family, we have all struggled in our own individual way over the years but it just saddens me that I haven’t achieved what people hope or dreamed I would be.

I feel that I have let a lot of my family and in ‘general’ people down. I never wanted the last ten years to be like this. It just seems such a blur. I feel that personal in my life that there has been times where the world has just frozen and stayed frozen for years, whilst the rest of the world slowly progresses forward and it is a fight to keep up with everybody.

This might not be the case but I feel and sense that my ‘mistakes’, ‘fails’ and ‘wrong turns’ are highlighted by everyone that knows me well. Nothing in my life is private or just kept between my close family networks. It feel as though everyone has to know everything. It feels very unbalanced and unfair in certain moments. Some aspects of ‘me’ are told to everyone and other times people decided what to say. I know that a lot of the conversation come from a place of love, concern and support but I believe I need to be the one to decide what I feel is appropriate and relative for people to know. Otherwise it can feel as though everyone has a piece of me and this makes me feel very powerless, helpless and frustrated all in one.

In this place and time one thing that is vitally important for me is to be in control of certain aspect of my personal life such as my PTSD, my strugglers and my strengths. I believe these are all normal and achievable areas that as I mature and develop into an adult, that I am able to express and request that others respect these boundaries. I have found that sometimes, when I go to address these issues, people are very quick to see it as a direct emotion attack on them and it is not.

If I take the trauma, the abuse and the last ten years of difficulty away, I believe this is a normal part of growing up, a normal change in how I would wish to share and express myself. This situation is no one’s fault or doing. I think sometimes family, friends, other people can accidentally look at me as the trauma, the girl with PTSD and sometimes through the uncertain, unpredictable and unpleasant moments, it feels as they forget I am a young adult, a human being. This is properly not the case but it feels like it.

My trauma doesn’t define me as a person but it seem to impact on daily life, the dynamics of a family changes and develops in different ways. It can be frustrating and long but deep down I know that my family, friends love me dearly and care for me so much but for me, my trauma has become a BIG ELEPHANT IN THE ROOM and I don’t want it there anymore. I want it to shrink in size and allow more of me to shine through because at the moment it affecting every aspect of my life, my family’s life from taking the next step forward, for all of us.

I some days feel squashed and suffocated by the elephant in the room. I wish it was a balloon that I could pop, burst and all of the past would fly into thin air but unfortunately this is not the case.

So for the time being I have to be patience with myself and my family. We are all working towards to same goal, same outcome but sometimes I know that I run before I can walk. My family are there to support and listen to me and guide me through the uncertain times ahead. I am grateful for that.

One day all of this confusion and pain will be a distance memory. This is my wish for the future.